October 2017

“Tell me where you live, and I can predict how well you’ll do in life.”

Does welfare vary largely across space?

Although I don’t have a crystal ball, I do know for a fact that location is an excellent predictor of one’s welfare. Indeed, a child born in Togo today is expected to live nearly 20 years less than a child born in the United States. Moreover, this child will earn a tiny fraction—less than 3%—of what his or her American counterpart will earn.

Working the land in Uganda: women make up more than half of Africa’s farmers but face the biggest barriers to owning land. Photo: Jonathan Torgovnik/Reportage by Getty Images

At first glance it might seem surprising that the African Center for Economic Transformation (ACET) has zeroed in on agriculture as the focus for our 2017 flagship report, launched this week at the World Bank’s Annual Meetings in Washington. But that’s precisely the point: this is not primarily about agriculture, it is about how you transform the broader economy, with agriculture as the catalyst.